


Boiled Eggs

by vidocqsociety



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-11-26
Updated: 2007-11-26
Packaged: 2017-11-10 05:42:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/462837
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vidocqsociety/pseuds/vidocqsociety
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Doctor discovers the added capabilities of his timey-wimey detector.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Boiled Eggs

Martha looked at the piles of junk on the table with a sigh. "You've been up all night, haven't you?"

"Yeah," replied the Doctor, distracted. He was playing MacGyver with little bits and bobs he had collected during the past few weeks from bins as he walked Martha to and from work every day. Right now he was connecting two wires using a gum wrapper and an unbent paperclip, his tongue just sticking out of the corner of his mouth. "I made coffee."

"Caffeine," observed Martha. "Just what you need." It _was_ what she needed, however. She put her hand to the pot: cold. Longing for a microwave, she poured the coffee out. She had been woken up once again by the screeching call of the neighbor's cockerel. Their downstairs neighbor Mrs. Czanecki, a farmer's wife from outside of Warsaw, had taken to raising chickens. While some may find the crow of a cockerel charmingly rustic, Martha had been plotting its assassination since they moved into their cheap first floor flat. And so every day she woke with the sun, because try as she might, she couldn't drown out the rooster's cry.

Deciding it was too early to deal with the Doctor's latest toy, a very used Sunbeam Coffeemaster, Martha chose to make tea. She filled the kettle up and placed it on the stove. She leaned her back against the counter and watched the Doctor. "What is that thing again?"

He pushed his glasses back up his nose. "It's a timey-wimey detector."

"Sounds very scientific."

"It is, actually." He fell silent as he started sonic screwdriving something. Martha used to know what the bits making up the timey-wimey detector were: a lunch box, a tape recorder reel, a bottle opener, a bit of rusty pipe. Now it was all slapped together, a postcard proclaiming 'wish you were here!' stuck to the front in jest. Martha rather liked that addition, considering it was hers. She had found it the day the Doctor had taken her to the dump to search for parts. It had stuck to her shoe. The Doctor leaned over her shoulder to get a better look, his sharp smell temporarily blocking out the stink of the garbage. She joked, "You should put this on your timey thing." He declared it an excellent idea and stuck it in his pocket. The next time Martha saw the contraption, the postcard was there.

The Doctor stuck his sonic screwdriver into a hole he had made on the side. The machine, if you could call it that, whirred to life. "Ah!" he crowed triumphantly. "It works!"

"What does it do?"

"It goes ding when there's stuff," said the Doctor, trying to make it sound impressive. The kettle whistled, and Martha, not bothering to ask the Doctor if fancied a mug, went about making two cups. She opened the refrigerator and pulled out the milk, holding the door open with her foot as she poured. A muffled pop sounded from the refrigerator. Martha put the milk down and looked into the fridge.

"What was that?"

"It wasn't a ding," observed the Doctor. He stood next to Martha, stooping down to get a full view of the interior. The timey-wimey detector continued to hum quietly in the background. "But that was definitely stuff."

Another muffled pop. Then another. The egg carton that had been shoved in the back seemed to be dancing. The lid kept bouncing open with each burst. Suddenly, the whole thing flew open, sending bits of egg flying everywhere. With yelps of surprise, the Doctor and Martha leapt backwards.

"What the hell was that?!" asked Martha, wiping the splattered egg from her face.

"Missed some," said the Doctor, running the pad of his thumb across her cheekbone. "There. All better."

"I wouldn't say 'all better' when I'm covered in raw egg," said Martha, trying to sound annoyed. It was difficult to do when her cheek still tingled from the Doctor's touch.

"It isn't raw," said the Doctor. "It's boiled." He glanced back at his timey rig. "It boils eggs. That's nice to know. In case you ever want a quick breakfast. Just keep on your toes." Martha glowered at him through her lashes as she picked egg shell shrapnel from her jumper. The Doctor caught on that she did not find the situation as amusing as he did. "Anyway, egg's good for your hair," he continued with a shrug. He added quickly, "Not that your hair isn't lovely the way it is." Opting not to stick his foot in his mouth any further, he returned to his contraption. Martha ran her hand down her hair with a grin, smoothing it out. It had been a concern of hers ever since they arrived. The straightening iron hadn't quite caught on yet, so she had to fall back on the technology around her: a real iron and a lot of faith in the Doctor's laundry skills. She spent the first week smelling of charred feathers.

A very loud swear came through the paper-thin wall of their flat. The Doctor switched off his detector and went into the corridor. Martha followed. Their neighbor, a shaggy-haired American stoner named Maurice, ran out in nothing but boxers and an open bathrobe. He was splattered with egg. He held the carton of broken shells in his hand. "Man."

"Man," repeated the Doctor with a nod.

"Doc, I think there's something wrong with my eggs."

"Really? What makes you say that?"

"They exploded." He held out the carton as proof. "Do eggs explode?"

"Only if they're past the expiration date," said the Doctor.

Maurice looked down at the carton, confused. "I thought I had a few more days."

"That's what they all say. And then they get salmonella."

This answer seemed to satisfy Maurice. He mumbled thanks and wandered back into his apartment. Martha looked at him with a raised eyebrow. "What did you want me to tell him, that my detector exploded them?" Martha rolled her eyes and went back into the apartment to change her shirt.

"Maurice's refrigerator is opposite ours, yeah?" called the Doctor from the kitchen.

"What?" replied Martha, slightly muffled by the top she was pulling on over her head. It was modern, but she liked it. She pulled on a blazer with brocade lapels that she had found on the cheap at the shop cattycorner from the one she worked at. A quick once-over in the mirror: she passed the sixties test. She re-entered the living room.

"In Maurice's flat, his refrigerator is on the far end from us." Martha shrugged. The Doctor continued, "How far away d'you reckon it is?"

"Why?"

"I want to know the radius my detector has."

"You want to know the egg-boiling radius your timey thing has?"

"Don't you?" The Doctor looked at the clock on the wall. "And don't you have work?"

"And that's why I changed." She half-jokingly asked him, "You like?"

"Very much," said the Doctor with a nod. "Let's get you to work. I have supplies to buy."

The walk to the shop was always the high point of Martha's day. Usually the Doctor was so wrapped up in his mess of a detector that he was even worse for conversation than usual. But the six blocks to the shop and the six blocks back, he was a completely different person. Almost normal, chatting about a new song he heard on the radio or what the neighbors had been up to when Martha was away. She liked him like this. It made being trapped in the sixties far more tolerable.

The small bell above the door jingled merrily as they entered. Martha greeted her fellow employees with a smile and a wave as the Doctor marched purposefully towards the back of the store.

"Back for more jelly babies, Doctor?" joked Hannah, the shop manager.

"No," called the Doctor. He returned with three dozen eggs and a wide grin. "Had a craving for omelets." He set them down at Martha's register. "Care to ring these up?"

"If you're going to make a mess, make sure you clean it up," said Martha. The Doctor paid and left. Martha leaned on the counter, not wanting to imagine the kind of chaos she was going to encounter after work.

*

Martha walked into the flat, annoyed. The Doctor hadn't been there when her shift was over. Not that she couldn't walk home by herself--she was a big girl after all--but she enjoyed the company. "Hello?" she called. "Where were you?" A familiar pop sounded from the living room. "Oh, no."

The sofa was covered in a large sheet, the original color having been what Martha could only guess was white. It was now spotted yellow, as was everything in the room. An episode of Benny Hill played in the background as three chairs were set up at intervals leading into the hall. Martha walked across the room and switched off the set. She noticed the sofa was pulled away from the wall. "Doctor."

The Doctor poked his head from behind the sofa. "Hello, Martha!" He checked the clock. "Your shift over already? I'm sorry! I'll make it up to you, I promise. But look!" He gestured to the room. "Isn't it brilliant?"

"You buying three dozen eggs with money we don't have to explode them is brilliant?"

"I found out the radius! Thirty paces. I set up some eggs across the hall in the kitchen and they're fine." He ran into the kitchen and returned with three eggs. He placed one on each surface and dragged Martha behind the sofa. "The first chair is ten paces, the second twenty, and the third thirty. The kitchen is about forty-two since I couldn't move the table any closer. Now watch." He switched on the detector and ducked behind the sofa. Martha followed suit. Three small bursts followed. He looked up. "See? Look in the kitchen. It's still on and the egg's not moving. That's been the same egg all afternoon. Not a scratch."

A shriek came from garden below. "What was that?" asked Martha, looking towards the window.

"I've no idea," said the Doctor. "Mrs. Czanecki's been screaming like that all afternoon. I've given up trying to figure that woman out. Some mysteries are best left unsolved."

Martha peered down at the garden. Mrs. Czanecki was yelling in Polish and chasing her chickens. There were several small piles of what could only be described as 'stuff' in the middle of her yard, dusted with chicken feathers. The chickens at the far end of the yard appeared fine, if startled, but the one closest to the building was acting strangely.

"Doctor," said Matha, waving at him to come over. "Take a look at the one hen. It looks like it's vibrating," said Martha. The Doctor watched in curiosity. With a screech, the chicken burst, leaving a similar pile of as chickeny stuff. Feathers floated down.

"That's not pretty," observed the Doctor.

Mrs. Czanecki yelped again, clutching dramatically at her head like a silent film star. She looked up at their window and pointed accusingly. She shouted at them in Polish, which Martha couldn't understand a word of. It was times like these when she missed the TARDIS the most. The Doctor shook his head and shrugged. If she was missing the TARDIS, she could only imagine what the Doctor was going through.

"You!" cried the old woman. "You move in, and you bring strangeness with you!"

"Oh. Well. She's got us there," said the Doctor with a grin.

"Us?" asked Martha. "You. I'm not the one who built a detector that boils eggs and explodes chickens."

"I didn't build a detector that explodes chickens! As least not intentionally. That has to count for something."

"Could you shut it off before you blow up any more?"

With a sigh, he went to turn off the device. He was stopped, however. The detector, true to the Doctor's word, suddenly went ding. "Stuff!" cried the Doctor, snapping up the detector with glee. "Let's go find it!" He grabbed Martha's hand and they were out the door.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted at my LiveJournal (academyaward.livejournal.com) and on Teaspoon (http://www.whofic.com/viewstory.php?sid=16420). Different screen names. All me. :)


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